Fiancees gather before 8 on Day 8 of Marry-In

San Francisco, Thursday, 19 Feb. 2004: Outside SF's ornate City Hall, at 0745 AM, the line of same-sex fiancees stretches almost one and one-half blocks. They wait for doors to open at 8AM, so they can get marriage licenses on Day Eight of the Marry-In.

In cool dry weather, some wannabe spouses read the Bay Area Reporter, the city's leading queer weekly. Others half-listen to a black male evangelist preacher, brandishing a Bible, exhorting them to come to God. Most turn their attention to their own lovers, relatives, and friends.

As rain has departed from the Marry-In, just temporarily, so have legal clouds. Yet fascists could halt this season of freedom at any moment, perhaps as soon as Friday, Feb. 20.

-- SUN of San Francisco
19 Feb.